


A Game Of

by sarken



Category: Dallas (TV 1978)
Genre: Episode: Cat and Mouse, Gen, Minor Character(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-31
Updated: 2014-07-31
Packaged: 2018-02-14 15:30:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2197044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarken/pseuds/sarken
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She knows her job isn't over until she leaves.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Game Of

**Author's Note:**

> The scene between Cliff and his one night stand in "Cat and Mouse" always leaves me feeling like there's something else going on there, something more than what's actually being said. This is a short retelling of the scene that explores who the woman might be. The dialogue and actions in this story come directly from the episode.

She just wants a bowl of cereal.

She knows she's not supposed to go digging through a client's kitchen, but she hasn't eaten since yesterday's lunch, and it's not like anyone will ever know. Still, it's nerves more than hunger that has her hands shaking as she opens a cupboard door.

A cookie sheet falls out, bouncing off the counter and hitting the floor with a clatter so loud it sounds like thunder.

"Shit," she swears, jumping back as another one follows, and before she can pick them up, her client's voice makes her jump.

"What are you doing?"

She wants to swear again, but she doesn't. She pitches her voice high, puts a little sway in her hips, and walks toward him with a smile on her face. "Well, good mornin', sleepyhead."

"You're not makin' breakfast," he says, gruff and quick, and she can't tell if he's angry or just confused.

"Of course I am," she says, because it's her job to say yes, to play along, to make him feel like he's in control. She might already have her money, but she knows she can't stop working until she steps out his front door. "Last night was so wonderful, and you're so wonderful, I just wanted to do something nice for you."

He laughs nervously as she plays with the satin of his robe. "I met you at the Oil Baron's Club, right?"

She's heard about the Oil Baron's, about lunches -- not dinners -- that cost what she makes in a week; she's even had clients offer to take her there, but she's never gone. She wouldn't know what to do in a place like that, and she can tell from the uncertainty in her client's voice that it's obvious she's not part of that world. But she doesn't know where to tell him they met, so she leans down and kisses him deeply, trying not to gag at the taste of last night's alcohol mixed with morning breath.

"Now do you remember?" she asks, smiling as he trips over his words while he tries to pretend.

"Yeah," he says. "Yeah, I remember."

She giggles like she believes him. "You're the sweetest man," she tells him, because she knows his type now, and that type is so easy. "But I don't know if I should."

He's right back to being nervous and on guard, the same man who was startled to find her in his kitchen. "Should what?"

"Move in with you." She just wants to leave.

"Do what?" He all but runs away from her then, turning, stepping back, clearing the path to the door.

It makes her laugh, how easy he is.

"It was last night," she says, "when we getting very... you know, romantic? But then you kept talking about that Pam person."

Pam is his sister; he told her that much. The way he kept going on about her, she was sure she knew what he was going to request. Most men don't hire prostitutes just to talk about their sisters.

"I talked about Pam?"

She sighs. No, she thinks, I just took a lucky guess. "Is she your girlfriend?"

He stands there and blinks at her, and she is beyond relieved when he doesn't deny it, when he realizes he should play along. "Why do you ask?"

Because she wants him to say this was a mistake, that she has to get out of here before his girlfriend gets home. Because she's going to pass out if she doesn't get to eat something soon. "Because you kept saying how sorry you were for all the bad things you've done to her."

"Yeah," he says. "Yeah, I -- I've... treated her very badly."

She's starting to feel bad for Pam now. Her brother  _has_  treated her terribly, and last night he did seem sorry, but in the sober light of day, his words are completely hollow.

She glances down at the floor, resigned to what she's about to do. Someday, she'll stop getting involved, stop acting like there's more to any of her jobs than sex... someday, when she's stopped caring that's the only thing anyone wants her for.

"Do you love her?"

"Yeah, I do," he says, and it might be the first time he's ever had to think about it, but it's also the first thing he's sounded sure of since last night.

"So tell her," she wants to say, "or at least apologize," but the phone rings then, and she watches him dive for it, lift it off the cradle just to hesitate and hang it back up.

It's enough to ruin the moment, and instead she goes back to the game. "That's why I can't move in with you," she says.

He tries to look disappointed and fails, but she doesn't even care. She's earned her seven hundred bucks, or at least the part of it that's hers, and she's going to walk out of this condo and go have breakfast somewhere.

She grabs her things from the couch before guilt kicks in and she remembers the job doesn't end until she walks out that door.

"Pam is lucky to have a man like you," she says, and she knows it's not what he needs to hear, but it's what he wants, and that's what the men all pay her for.


End file.
